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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To let DS (5) use public loos alone?

120 replies

MamaLazarou · 02/09/2015 17:15

In the shopping centre this afternoon and I decided to let DS go to the loo on his own, much to the horror of a bystander who told me 'you just never know who's in there'. It hadn't occurred to me to worry about predatory paedophiles hanging around in public loos. AIBU to let DS have this little bit of independence?

OP posts:

FuryFowler · 02/09/2015 21:30

No no no! Yabu!

goblinhat · 02/09/2015 21:35

No way- far too young.

Katniramal · 02/09/2015 21:40

No way. Too young. A 12 year old boy in my home town was sexually assaulted in the local shopping arcade toilets last Friday

I had only just been allowing my 10 year old SN DS to use those loos alone recently. Not a chance I'll do that anymore.

CrapBag · 02/09/2015 21:52

YABU. I knew about the girl in Sainsburys, Asda and the boy at McDonald's (also the 14 year old in Debenhams a few yeas ago). Those alone are enough for me to keep telling 7 year old DS he can't use the men's (much to his disgust, he isn't happy about it) but with all the others on here it just reaffirms that I am doing the right thing and I will be sticking to it. The only ones I let him use is at our swimming pool where the opening to both toilets is together and you turn left for women's and right for mens and there are no doors. I can also talk to him from the ladies.

SouthernShepherdess · 02/09/2015 22:32

No way, not that young. I let my dd who is 9 (only when she turned 9 have I let her really), go in alone, but I always wait right outside the main door (not the loo door, the outer door). And if she's too long I will check she's ok etc. Me and my sister were stalked and followed in an M&S store some years ago by a man, that was shockingly a member of staff like security or the like. He follwed us up the escalator and kept staring at us. He must have known we were heading for the loo on the first floor. I remember going in a cublicle and aware that someone was in the cubicle next to me, I thought nothing of it as assumed like you would it was another woman. My sister never went in a cubicle, but was looking in the mirror while I was still in the cubicle and to her horror the person that came out of the cubicle next to me was the creep that was gawping at us! She looked down and froze in fear. When we came out he had his backed turned and was leaning on some railing. I cannot to this day believe quite what had happened. He somehow got to the loo ahead of us, he must have gone to it a different way to us, and it still makes me blood run cold when I occasionally think about it. He went in there to spy on us going to the loo. Why on earth didn't we report him. We must have been too shocked! No one is completely safe in public places!

ChristineDePisan · 02/09/2015 22:36

5 is too young, I think, unless it is somewhere like a private sports club where you know that whoever is in there will ensure that DS doesn't get up to mischief, washes his hands properly and can get the loo to flush OK

BertieBotts · 02/09/2015 22:43

I sometimes used to let DS go in aged five if he wanted to. He went through a phase of insisting on using the men's until I explained that really it wasn't boys' and girls' toilets but mummies' and daddies' toilets - then he was perfectly happy to go in whichever toilet with the adult he was with at the time. At seven I usually give him the choice and more often than not he comes in with me or goes with his Dad if he can - he doesn't like going alone unless it's a very small place.

There was a very distressing incident at a local supermarket some years ago where an eleven year old girl was raped in the ladies' toilets, but I don't think you can live your life around these kinds of extremely rare occurrences. Eleven is definitely old enough to go alone and that poor girl was just extremely unlucky.

They go alone to school toilets at five so I think it's what they are happy with really.

Unhappyuser · 02/09/2015 22:45

What's wrong with you lot? There are not paedophiles on every corner. Your children are more likely to be molested by a family member, better keep him away from his dad eh!

Unhappyuser · 02/09/2015 22:48

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

SouthernShepherdess · 02/09/2015 22:50

You think that's a load of rubbish do you? No, that really happened actually. Would I really spend my time making something like that up?!

ChristineDePisan · 02/09/2015 22:53

I'm not unduly worried about paedophiles in the toilets - as other pps have said, it's about making sure that they do everything that they need to do without adult help. School toilets are a bit different, surely, because everything in them is child-sized, familiar and easy for them to use. Most gents are predominantly adult sized urinals, which a 5yo will struggle with, or cubicles, which I'm told no-one uses unless desperate because they are gross

crumblybiscuits · 02/09/2015 22:53

Unhappy, why don't you just Google sexual assault public toilets and see all the articles that come up including one in March in London about a six year old boy and a complete stranger. But no, obviously no one gets abused by a stranger

Farandole · 02/09/2015 22:53

I agree with Unhappy! Did I just stumble on the Daily Mail website?!

Risk avoidance in this country is really going too far.

CoffeeChocolateWine · 02/09/2015 22:55

My DS is almost 7 and wants to use the gents rather than the ladies now. I always have a sneaky look at the loos whenever I go places before I decide whether to let him. If it is just a single cubicle then I let him use the gents by himself but if there is more than one cubicle then he has to come with me. I certainly wouldn't let him use the public toilets in a shopping centre by himself...way too young.

dementedDementor · 02/09/2015 22:58

Unhappyuser I don't think anyone on this thread thinks paedophiles are lurking on every corner but a little child alone in a toilet is particularly vulnerable. It's an enclosed space and involves getting in a state of undress.

Many people on this thread have actual experience of being followed into toilets etc. I mentioned my friend who was sexually assaulted in a public toilet when he was a little boy. More than one poster has said that opportunistic attacks are more likely to take place in a public toilet.

I think it's really bad form to say someones experience is a load of rubbish.

Charis1 · 02/09/2015 23:05

No way can a 5 year old judge if the floor of a cubicle is too dirty to walk on, or the seat too dirty to sit on.

whattodohatethis · 02/09/2015 23:05

Totally outing myself here.
I went against my rules and let my 6 year old son go in the gents toilet on his own while I waited outside because the ladies was being cleaned and he was desperate.
A young couple came over to advise me that a man was masturbating openly in the toilets.

Never again. He can pee in a bush if sonething means I can't go in with him

elvisthehamster · 02/09/2015 23:06

When ds was little one of my friends who is a physiatric nurse told me how she never let her ds use the public toilets alone as patients who had abused had told her that they had done so in public toilets. I was pretty shocked and it has always stayed with me.

Ds is now 11-up until he was about 8 I was making him come into the ladies with me, now if dh is around I prefer that he goes with him at the same time. In our local shopping centre there is a couple of family toilet cubicles -makes things easier.

He is at the age now that his friends and he are beginning to want to go to the shopping centre/cinema themselves, Obviously he will need to go to the gents at some point.. I try and encourage that they go a couple of them at the same time but don't want to put the fear of death in him.

clary · 02/09/2015 23:06

I personally think 5 is a bit young for reasons mentioned by PP - locking and then unlocking the door, knowing what to do if worried, washing hands etc.

Also yy DH says men's loos are minging (this came up when he asked if he could send DD into the ladies' when out with her without me - I think she was about 6-7).

But these stories about children being molested , horrible and tragic tho they are, are often about 10-11-12 yos. Surely no one here is saying a 12yo boy should be using the ladies' loos? I don't think my 12yo would stand for that.

We need to teach our DC what to do and how to stay safe and then let them move into the adult world. But I do agree that a 5yo probably can't do that yet.

SouthernShepherdess · 02/09/2015 23:07

I agree demented. I'm quite shocked that someone would challenge something like that, and rather annoyed that someone implies I'm lying about something that really did happen and at the time was quite a nasty experience!

cornflakegirl · 02/09/2015 23:09

I let my just 6yo use go in the mens by himself sometimes, although he still comes with me if I need a wee too. I also let him travel in cars. I know of far more people injured in car accidents than have been assaulted in public loos.

Nospringflower · 02/09/2015 23:14

I am not usually particularly cautious, nor is my partner, but he has always been adamant that we shouldn't let our children go into male public toilets alone.

I don't mind in pubs and places like that but public loos or shopping centres are no-go's. Through my job I hear a lot about places paedophiles go or people looking for gay sex (who aren't a risk but not what you want your kids coming across) etc and although it probably happens more often in other places, public toilets are known hangouts - as are train stations.

LoveChickens · 02/09/2015 23:18

That was a very poor choice on your part. I hope you don't do it again.

Thatrabbittrickedme · 02/09/2015 23:30

I would not even consider for a moment letting DS aged 5 go in to the gents alone. Fortunately he doesn't have an issue coming with me to the ladies yet. I also don't allow DD aged 7 go into a cubicle alone. She's not shown any desire to do so yet either. I have no idea when I will feel comfortable letting them go alone, I just know it is most definitely not yet.

I appreciate the incidences we have all heard of are rare, I make no apologies for living my life accommodating the very real risks however rare they may be. I'm quite shocked others feel otherwise, it doesn't harm to be cautious.

MaddyinaPaddy · 02/09/2015 23:31

There was a 14 yr old boy raped in shopping mall gents a few years back? Do we still bring teenagers into the ladies then? These things are very rare you can't eliminate all risk. As to having to supervise a five year olds hand washing!! Well I despair!! stop infantilizing your children. As for the poster taking her all-but-ten yo in to the ladies, that is not on.I have asked boys this ave before wtf a big boy like them is doing in the females toilet/changing room

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